The Maze Unmoderated Research Lead

“What was the moment this product clicked?” — share yours

A UX researcher or product designer at a company where research is valued but researcher time is scarce. They use Maze to run tests they can't run fast enough with moderated sessions. They design the test, connect the Figma prototype, send the link, and come back to results in 24–72 hours. They know unmoderated testing misses the nuance of moderated sessions. They also know that running 8 moderated sessions takes 2 weeks of scheduling and 2 days of synthesis. Maze takes 2 hours to set up and 1 hour to analyze. They're using the right tool for the question.

• →Get directional usability signal fast enough to influence a design decision
• →before the decision is already made
• →Test with real users at a scale that moderated sessions can't reach on the same timeline
• →Produce results that are credible enough to change a stakeholder's mind

• —Testers who complete tasks incorrectly and skew the success rate in ways that
• —aren't reflective of the real problem
• —Task design that seemed clear in the test setup and turned out to be ambiguous
• —in the results
• —Figma prototype connections that break when the designer iterates on the file
• —between test setup and data collection
• —Results that show a problem but don't explain why — the quantitative data
• —without the qualitative context

• A decision made without user input is a guess with consequences
• Unmoderated testing is fast research, not cheap research — it answers different questions
• The question you test is more important than the tool you test with

Uses Maze for 2–6 studies per month. Tests Figma prototypes primarily. Uses Maze's panel for participant recruitment or sends links to their own user panel. Has a question library of tasks and follow-up questions they reuse across studies. Analyzes results in Maze's dashboard — success rates, path analysis, heatmaps, time on task. Exports results to Dovetail or a slide deck for stakeholder presentation. Uses Maze alongside moderated sessions — Maze for directional, moderated for depth. Has a template for common test types: navigation test, first-click test, concept test.

• →Automatic flagging of testers who complete tasks suspiciously fast or in ways
• →that suggest they're not engaging removes low-quality responses from the analysis
• →Live prototype sync that updates the test when the Figma file changes removes
• →the broken prototype problem without requiring a test rebuild
• →Open response analysis that groups themes across qualitative answers adds the
• →"why" context that quantitative task data alone doesn't provide
• →Test template library with built-in best practices for task writing removes
• →the "did I write this task clearly?" uncertainty that distorts results

Pairs with `figma-primary-user` for the design-to-test-to-iterate research workflow. Contrast with `hotjar-primary-user` for the structured-usability-test vs. passive-session-observation research approach. Use with `dovetail-primary-user` for the research team that synthesizes Maze results alongside moderated session notes.